The present invention relates broadly to energy absorption devices and, more particularly, to an improved energy absorption device adapted to form a physical barrier to prevent damage to various surfaces prone to frequent impact, such as motor vehicle side door and quarter panels, boat docks, building walls, furniture dollies, fork lifts, etc.
As is well known, it is often times desirable and/or necessary to protect impact prone surfaces from damage caused by periodic impact, for instance, motor vehicle side door and quarter panels, boat docks, hallways, forklifts and the like. With specific relation to motor vehicle side door and quarter panels, it has heretofore been customary practice to affix elongate resilient molding strips to the side door and quarter panels of the vehicles which tend to reduce the severity of periodic impact and thereby reduce damage to the vehicle panels.
Typically, such prior art molding strips have been formed of elongate strips of elastomeric material such as rubber which are rigidly affixed to the outermost contours of the vehicle side door and quarter panels to form a resilient guard or barrier to protect the vehicle panels. To conform to aesthetic considerations of the vehicle, such prior art molding strips typically have been formed in a relatively narrow size which do not extend too far outwardly from the vehicle panel surfaces. Although such prior art molding strip devices have proven generally satisfactory for their intended purpose, they possess inherent deficiencies which have detracted from their overall effectiveness.
Foremost of these deficiencies has been the inability of the prior art molding strips to thoroughly prevent impact damage to the vehicle panels. This inability has been primarily due to their narrow size configuration which often protects only certain portions of the vehicle panels located in close proximity to the molding strips while allowing impact to other portions located below and above the molding strips. Similarly, such prior art holding strips often times are not mounted to the vehicle at the vehicle's maximum side panel protrusion nor are they capable of compensating for differing curvatures found in various models of vehicles. Although the severity of this deficiency could be reduced by forming the molding strips in larger size configurations, such larger configurations would necessarily detract from the desired aesthetics of the vehicle. In addition, due to the prior art molding strip devices relying solely upon the energy absorption qualities inherent in elastomeric material, such devices have typically been capable of protecting the vehicle surface from only minor impact forces with moderate or strong impact forces often resulting in damage to the molding strip itself as well as to the vehicle surface. Further, such prior art molding strips have typically proven difficult to install upon a vehicle surface and additionally have proven relatively costly in use.
Thus, there exists a substantial need in the art for a relatively low cost energy absorption device which provides improved impact absorption characteristics and compensates for differing sidewall curvatures of motor vehicles while being aesthetically commensurate with vehicle design considerations.